Bernard Amory

What happened ? The European Court of Justice ("ECJ") set aside a General Court ruling that had upheld a €1.06 billion fine imposed by the European Commission on Intel for abusing its dominant position in the market for x86 central processing units ("CPUs"). Background In its 2009 decision, (...)

The European Court of Justice ("CoJ") has upheld the European Commission’s use of evidence transmitted by a national authority other than a Member State competition authority in a cartel investigation. The CoJ ruled on April 27, 2017, that the national authority properly transmitted such (...)

The European Commission has published revised safe harbor rules for agreements that are not deemed to appreciably restrict competition. This is the so-called "De Minimis Notice," the first version of which dates back to 2001. At the same time, the Commission also published guidance on the (...)

The European Court of Justice (ECJ) has upheld the expansive geographic reach of a European Commission dawn raid decision in the electric cables cartel investigations. Nexans, one of ten companies being investigated, had argued that the geographic scope was overbroad and provided an (...)

The European Court of Justice has upheld a €30 million fine against cartel whistleblower Deltafina, which was imposed following the withdrawal of Deltafina’s conditional immunity as a result of the breach of its duty to cooperate under the European Commission’s leniency program. This ruling (...)

European Union Adopts New Rules for Technology Licensing Agreements* The European Union has a new regime for assessing technology licensing agreements under EU competition law. The new rules include a new technology transfer block exemption regulation (“TTBER”), which exempts certain bilateral (...)

A profound change to the institutional and procedural landscape for competition law in Belgium has taken place with the enactment of new competition law provisions in the Belgian Code of Economic Law (Chapter IV, Protection of Competition and Chapter V, Competition and Price Evolution). These (...)

Following dawn raids on the premises of electric cable manufacturers, the European General Court has partially overturned two EU Commission inspection decisions, finding the scope of inspection to be overreaching in scope. This is the first time that a court has annulled (albeit partially) a (...)

The European Court of Justice ("ECJ") has adopted new rules of procedure, replacing previous rules that had remained largely untouched since their adoption in 1953. The goal of these changes is to speed up ECJ proceedings, but these new rules may also reduce transparency and undercut parties’ (...)

Companies and individuals that are accused of price-fixing rarely go to trial. Indeed, in the last 10 years, no corporate defendant (and only a handful of individuals) has elected to litigate an international criminal cartel case in a U.S. court. The vast majority of cases are resolved through (...)

On March 3, 2011, Advocate General (AG) Mazák delivered an opinion to the European Court of Justice (ECJ) in Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique SAS (PFDC). PFDC, a French manufacturer of cosmetics and personal care products, prohibited its retailers from selling via the Internet. AG Mazák advised the (...)

On Wednesday, 3 December 2008, the European Commission issued the long awaited Communication on abusive exclusionary conduct by dominant undertakings. This marks the end of an extensive review process, launched in December 2005 by the Commission’s Staff Discussion Paper on exclusionary abuses (...)

This week, in separate new matters, the United States and the European Union announced the detection and prosecution of price fixing agreements among competitors. The U.S. Department of Justice reported guilty pleas and fine agreements by three Asian manufacturers of liquid crystal display (...)

This week, in separate new matters, the United States and the European Union announced the detection and prosecution of price fixing agreements among competitors. The U.S. Department of Justice reported guilty pleas and fine agreements by three Asian manufacturers of liquid crystal display (...)

The detection and punishment of illegal cartels are at the top of the European Commission’s enforcement agenda. In 2001, the Commission meted out record fines in cartel cases totaling $ 1.6 billion, eclipsing the U.S. single-year record of $ 1.1 billion. Historically, the Commission’s fabled « (...)